Fine
by cowlicklesschick
Summary: Walter's fine. He's always fine. Unless Paige isn't fine. And then he is anything but fine, and maybe that's okay. TWO-SHOT. Part 2 coming soon.
1. Chapter 1

As a general rule, Walter hates guns.

He understands the need for them sometimes; Cabe's use of a firearm doesn't bother him. It's for protection and he trusts their agent to never harm a human being unless left no other option.

But today…today he _detests_ guns.

As most of their cases seemed to go, the assignment went from casual to tricky to lethal in about ten minutes. He'd started out sitting at a computer desk, and ended on his knees with his hands in the air, agreeing to whatever it was that the cartel leader wanted, so long as they didn't hurt _her_.

Paige.

Paige had been at the other end of a gun barrel today. Again. Only this time, it had been worse – there had been real fear in her eyes. That fear had nearly been his undoing.

He had tried to go to her. Had pulled against the ropes that lashed him against the columns of the warehouse, with Happy and Toby on either side of him and Sylvester at his back. He had thrashed and shouted, only for the man to press the mouth of the gun barrel a little harder against her.

She had been visibly trembling. He would never forget the way she had looked at him, the way she had said his name, imploring him to find a solution. It will haunt his dreams for the rest of his life, he knows.

Worse still had been when the cartel leader pulled the trigger.

She'd hit the floor, and he had tasted bile in his throat when she didn't move.

That was when Cabe showed up, accompanied by Homeland agents, one of whom ran over to the team and untied the ropes around their wrists.

The instant he was free, Walter had sprinted to her side, rolling her over and trying not to give in to the panic that clawed at the inside of his chest. He watched Toby check her pulse, apply pressure with Sylvester's sweater that the analyst had all but ripped off.

"She's going to be fine," was all the doc had said.

Walter is still trying to believe him, to let the words soak in to ease the horrible lump in his throat.

If this is what having emotions is like, he doesn't want them. He feels like the floor has been ripped out from under his feet – an illogical statement to even _think_. He can look down and see the grimy white hospital tiles clearly. The floor is right there.

Unbidden, his eyes leave his bloody hands, travel upwards to stare at the door Paige disappeared behind forty-seven and a half minutes ago.

She didn't wake up during the ride to the hospital. He had her hand the whole way here, had walked beside the gurney until security made him stop, and he's still surprised at how hard it was to let her go. All he wants right now is to hold her. Logically that wouldn't make him feel any better. But his brain is short-circuiting, refusing to operate the way it normally does. Instead all he can focus on is the anger, the pain, and the _fear_.

Walter hasn't ever felt fear before. He doesn't like it. Wants it to go away, like the dried blood under his fingernails.

Dully, he's grateful that he isn't alone. Cabe went to pick up Ralph from school – he was the only one of them who was in any state to drive – but the others are sitting around him, and he can feel their support without verbalization. He's keeping a close eye on Toby, because if a genius doctor is worried or afraid then they're all screwed.

"She's gonna be fine, Walt," the shrink says, like he knows he's being scrutinized. His voice is quiet, but when he turns to meet Walter's gaze, there's only tension on his face, not fear. That realization helps Walter relax in the stiff plastic chair.

A little, anyway.

"I should have – " he mutters, only for Happy to lean over, reaches for him; Toby leans back, while Sylvester and Walter stare in surprise at the hand on the latter's knee.

"Don't do that, Walter," she says, quiet but strong. Happy is more indestructible than any machine she'll ever make, but right now her eyes are shining brighter than normal and there are deep, sad lines around her mouth that he's never seen before.

Toby must have seen them, though, because he puts an arm around her and she leans closer, letting her head rest on the doc's chest. Vaguely Walter feels Sly put one hand on his shoulder, and Toby reaches up to put his free hand on top of Walter's wild curls.

Their little cyclone, hanging by threads, huddles together in the dingy hospital corridor.

/

Three days later, and their group has moved from unforgiving waiting-room chairs, onto the couch in Paige's room.

She's stable, but critical, the doctors keep telling them.

Walter's brain automatically puts those terms into his own dialect – Paige has a sixty-three percent chance of surviving.

Toby has hardly left her side; it's not for lack of trust in her assigned physicians, it's more for Walter's sake, to tell him that the doctors aren't trying to cushion the blow, that Paige really is healing. Slowly, so slowly that Walter thinks he might be imagining it, but she's healing.

He brings his laptop from the garage, spending his days trying to work while all he's really doing is staring, wanting to see when she finally opens her eyes.

Cabe comes to visit that afternoon; he brings lunch for them to share, which Walter's grateful for. This is a state-of-the-art facility, but hospital food will always be just that – hospital food.

He's halfway through his burger when Cabe sets his to-go cup down and leans back in his chair.

"I'm proud of you, kid."

Walter glances up, swallows the bite in his mouth, before asking, "What for?"

"I think you know."

He couldn't deny it any longer; he'd been catching curious glances from the team ever since it happened. At first he'd been too emotionally high-strung to care, but now…the buzz of fear hasn't gone away, really, it's more like white noise that he's grown accustomed to. But just because it's in the back of his mind doesn't mean he's ignoring it.

"She…she wouldn't want me to say I'm fine, when I'm not."

Cabe nods. He understands probably better than anyone Walter's need to always be _fine_.

But he also understands, better than the team sometimes credits him, why it's important to _not_ be fine every once in a while.

"Rebecca was in bad car accident, before our daughter was born. It's hard, seeing them like this."

Walter doesn't know what to say – Cabe meant the words to be comforting, empathetic, and they were. But Rebecca is clearly alive and well, and Paige…he doesn't know yet.

Instead of replying, he glances at the bed again; he and Cabe finish their lunch in silence.

/

When she finally does wake up, she almost gives him a heart attack.

The nurses were kind enough to bring him pillow and blankets so he could sleep on the couch. He wasn't getting much rest, but he did at least try to doze off during the night.

It's somewhere around three in the morning when he wakes up, slowly and disoriented. It feels as though his ears are stuffed with cotton; his eyes don't want to open and there's a truly horrendous taste in his mouth. He manages to sit up, rubs his hands roughly across his face, wondering why he woke up when it feels like he's more tired than he was when he fell asleep to start with, when he hears it.

"Wal...ter..."

He stiffens, not entirely sure he didn't imagine it. It comes again – that pitiful, croaky little voice, calling his name. Croakiness aside, he'd recognize that voice anywhere.

Cautiously, he chances a peek, and nearly jumps out of his skin when his eyes meet hers in the dim light of the room.

Before he even realizes he's moving, Walter is sitting on the edge of the mattress and has her hands in his.

"Paige?"

Her eyes flutter, and something that's probably supposed to resemble a smile appears. "Hey."

Despite himself, a short laugh forces its way past his lips, even as his throat tightens to the point where it actually, physically _hurts_ to swallow.

Paige smiles a little wider at the sound, but it instantly changes to a grimace when she shifts in bed.

"I'll call the nurse – "

"No," she says. She takes a deep breath. "I'm okay. Just caught me off guard, that's all."

He lets his hand hover over the call button a second longer before dropping it; she's already drifting off again, and while Walter doesn't want her to go again, not when she just woke up, part of him knows – the science part of him, the part that used to be the only one that mattered – that rest is what she needs more than anything. So he puts one hand on her cheek and smooths his thumb over her cheekbone, smiling a little when she nestles her face further into his palm.

"Ralph?" Her eyes crack open again. He nods.

"He's fine. Drew is coming this weekend. Until then we're taking him in turns. He'll want to come see you soon."

Through the pain, the weariness, he can see relief. He smiles again and smooths his rough palm over her hair. She sighs a little, and he repeats the motion until her even breathing tells him she's sound asleep, and only then does he step into the hallway and take out his phone.

"Walt? Everything okay?" Toby isn't all the way awake yet, but still on high alert. Absently Walter wonders how he's going to thank the doc, for being diligent and understanding his need to have genius answers, not just the ones the other doctors were giving him.

"Everything's fine," he finally manages. "She just woke up for a couple of minutes."

Toby sighs in relief; he relays the message to Happy, and call Walter crazy but he can practically hear the mechanic smiling over the phone.

"Make sure Cabe knows first thing in the morning," he says. "I'd call him too, but Ralph is at his place tonight and hasn't been getting enough sleep as it is."

"Sure thing," Toby says. "I'll call Sly, too – you sound bushed, Walter. Go get some shut eye, okay?"

"Yeah," Walter says, surprised at how heavily the exhaustion hits him, now that the paralyzing fear, the fear of Paige not waking up, is gone.

He thinks he says goodnight, he's not sure, but he goes back in the room, and as tired as he is he still can't stop himself from going to her side one more time, brushing the backs of his fingers down her jaw.

He smiles.

"I'm fine now," he tells her.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Yeah, so I lied. There's gonna be a third chapter to this. It'll be this one, only from Paige's perspective, plus a little more on the end. Hope you like it, and thank you all tons for the feedback and for reading. *blows kisses***_

/

Walter's car is piece of crap. He knows that. He's pretty sure he would still know it without being a genius.

But that doesn't mean Toby has to comment on the magnitude of its crappiness every five minutes. That's just uncalled for, especially since Toby didn't want to drive his own car to get lunch.

"You are aware that Happy knows how to fix cars, right?"

He sighs. "Toby – "

"I mean, you'd have to barter or pay her, but she'd be able to fix the shocks for you. Maybe even a new air filter. Because I'm pretty sure your vents are connected to the LA county landfill."

"Roll down your window – no vomiting allowed in the car."

Toby squints at him. "Are you kidding me? Barf stains would be an _improvement_ to this tragic excuse for upholstery – I'm afraid to even ask what some of these stains are. At least we can rule out one night stands in the back seat."

Walter scoffs. "That back seat would be a highly inefficient place for sexual activity. It's tiny – no matter what positions the two persons took, it would be acutely uncomfortable for both of them."

There's a beat of silence, then Toby simply turns away to stare out his window. "Unbelievable," he mutters under his breath.

Walter doesn't ask what he means; in his experience it's usually best to appreciate Toby's rare moments of withholding information when they come, and given the topic of their conversation there's really no guessing as to what would come out of the shrink's brain.

Mercifully, they arrive at the garage a few minutes later, and the two of them carry the takeout boxes to the door, where Walter suddenly pauses.

"C'mon, Walt, I'm starving," Toby complains.

Walter hushes him, and leans toward the door. There it is again – muffled shouting that sounds an awful lot like Happy. The problem is, the only two people she normally yells at are currently standing outside the garage. He and Toby exchange looks of worried confusion before going inside where one of the most bizarre sights Walter could ever imagine greets them.

Paige is sitting at the communal table, hands in her lap and every last minute detail in her body language screaming guilt. Even Walter can pick up on that.

What's weirder is Happy, Sly, and Cabe all standing in front of her, arms crossed and looking like disappointed parents.

He takes a moment to process the odd role reversal, before he clears his throat. Happy, who's still shouting, cuts off mid-syllable and takes a deep breath. She looks positively beside herself with outrage, and Walter doesn't have a clue what course of action to take.

Thankfully, Toby knows how to handle the Happy factor in the equation.

"I got you dumplings," he says, "with extra soy sauce. It's nice out; wanna eat on the roof?"

Happy follows him up the stairs without saying a word; Sylvester and Cabe take their food the kitchen table, and Paige slowly gets up and heads for the ramp that leads to the loft.

Walter follows, and doesn't figure out how to phrase his question until they're both seated on his couch. He doesn't want it to seem like the whole team is ganging up on her; however, he realizes that he's _never_ seen Cabe upset with her before. There must be a good reason. Still, he should at least let her explain before he jumps down her throat too.

"Are you hurt?" he asks quietly. Paige shakes her head. She won't look at him, instead staring at her container of rice and chicken. She has to hold it between her knees since her arm is in a sling. Her free hands picks at the food with the chopsticks.

"Could you please tell me what happened?"

Paige sighs. "I…I'm not really sure I want to."

"I understand that," Walter says, suddenly aware of his voice – it can't sound like it does when he's doing his calculations aloud. How did Paige coach him in that case with Sima? He tries to soften his tone, make it more gentle and comforting. "But…maybe you should. You're upset, and so is everyone else. I'd like to help fix it, if I can, but that will be rather difficult if I don't know what the problem is."

Finally, she looks up at him. There are tears in her eyes – Walter surprised himself a long time ago with his ability to read her emotions. He's never been able to do that with anyone else, but with Paige it's like those hazel eyes of hers make everything an open book for him. And right now, she looks even guiltier than she did downstairs.

"You're not going to be happy with me."

"What is it?"

"I…I tried to sneak and carry some case files upstairs."

He frowns. "Well, you're allowed up here, if they needed to be on my desk – "

"No, I mean, up _the_ stairs."

"Oh." He pauses, not wanting to get angry right away. "That…that could have ended very badly, Paige."

They'd agreed – Toby especially – that it would be best for Paige to stick to using the ramp for a while. It was great physical therapy for her, but the stairs were at a steeper incline and posed a risk for overexertion.

"I know. I just…I'm so appreciative of everything you guys have done, but it's hard not to be impatient."

"Believe me, I know how that feels," he smiles ruefully. "But you need to trust Toby on this. How heavy were the files?"

She bit her lip. "Sly said they were roughly eighteen and a half."

" _Pounds?_ "

"I know," she says again. "I _know_ , Walter. It was incredibly selfish and stupid of me, and I'm sorry. Really. I should have known."

He frowns in confusion. "Known what?"

She doesn't answer at first, just looks at him, but her lip trembles and it takes every shred of self-control he has not to reach for her.

"Paige – ?"

"I'm sorry," she chokes out. "I didn't know – I mean, I _should_ have, of _course_ you would have been…but I just didn't realize how _much_ , and I – "

"Paige – " She's starting in the middle, and he doesn't know what she's talking about but she looks like she's on the verge of an emotional meltdown that he has no idea how to handle.

" – but then Happy told me, and then they saw me carrying those stupid files upstairs, and then Cabe said that you had almost cut your wrists to the bone, trying to get to me – "

Walter inhales sharply. _That's_ what this is about?

He supposes he should have seen this coming. It's been five weeks, and they haven't talked about that day yet.

"Okay," he says, setting their food on the coffee table. If he's going to have a heart to heart – or whatever they call it – then he needs to have no distractions. "I guess…I guess we need to talk."

"Oh, Walter," she says. "I didn't – you don't have to, I understand that day was awful, it was for all of us. I didn't bring it up to make you uncomfortable, it's fine – "

"No," he interrupts quietly. "It's not fine. _I'm_ not fine. I mean, m-more than I was, but…" he trails off, swallows thickly. "That…that day, Paige…we've done s-some crazy things, but nothing has ever  
sc…s-scared me more than seeing you get hurt."

The tears spill over, leaving shining trails on her cheeks. "Walter – "

"Cabe's right; I was bleeding badly from trying to break free of our bonds." He looks down at his wrists, where the scars are fading.

He remembers suddenly looking down and realizing that not all of the red on his hands came from Paige. Toby had monitored closely for infection, but he doesn't remember them ever hurting. Maybe because he'd been hurting so much inside that the rest of him had just gone numb.

"Anyway, once you'd woken up that night in the hospital, we all knew you were going to be okay. But I guess…I guess all of us are still scared, of _how_ scared we were. Especially me, because I usually don't feel fear."

He glances up, finds her eyes riveted on him, and somehow, he finds the courage to reach over and brush the backs of his fingers against her cheek, like that night in the hospital. "And also b-because…you mean a lot to me. In some ways more than anybody else on the team. A-and I've been ignoring those feelings for so long, that when I saw we might lose you, that _I_ might lose you, it was…i-it was like the full depth of my feelings were suddenly thrown in my face."

Paige doesn't look guilty anymore. Now she looks stunned.

"I couldn't pretend I was fine anymore."

At some point he'd scooted closer. He doesn't remember moving, but Paige isn't backing away so he doesn't really care. He leans towards her, both of his hands on her face now. His fingers are curled around the back of her neck; he can feel her silky hair and her soft skin, can smell that lavender hand cream that he's come to love more than any scent on earth.

"Walter," she says again. He can feel the whisper on his skin, and unless he's suddenly developed an imagination, there is _longing_ in her voice. It gives him the courage to lean the rest of the way in, and then he can't think at all anymore, because Paige kisses him back immediately.

It's quieter than their first, yet deeper and so intense Walter's head feels like it's spinning. He kisses her again, harder, and there it is – that soft, little whimper she'd made last time, the one that has been ingrained in his memory ever since. It's even better than he remembers. Slowly, gently, he leans her against the back of the couch, and hovers over her as he kisses her like he's wanted to ever since that conversation they'd had in the weather balloon.

He's careful not to jar her shoulder; her good hand is on his chest, right over his heart, and her fingertips are just long enough for him to feel them against the bare skin that shows above the top button of his shirt. There is nothing frantic or desperate about any of this, despite his leaping pulse or the short gasps both of them are taking for air.

His lips leave hers, move down to her neck, and she buries her face in his shoulder, fists her fingers in his shirt.

"Walter," she gasps.

He really likes when she does that. He kisses her neck, even dares to suck – not hard enough to mark her, just enough for her to feel it – and he's rewarded with another whimper of his name.

"I thought I lost you." The words are out before he can stop them, and he freezes, sure he just ruined this fantastic moment they were having, but she takes his hand, puts it on her chest. He feels the quickened, steady thump of her heartbeat, and presses his forehead against hers.

"I'm right here," she says, and kisses him again. "I'm fine."

For the first time since her body was on the floor of the warehouse, red staining the concrete and the gunshot still echoing in his ears, Walter believes her.

/


	3. Chapter 3

"Paige, please – "

She looks up darkly. "Toby, if you tell me to be careful one more time…"

The doc wisely doesn't say anything else, but keeps a firm grip on her hand until she's fully seated in the old armchair that Walter had dragged in from the back of the garage. They've got it set up beside the red couch, with a table that has snacks and the tv remote and a box of tissues and hand sanitizer and even a bell (Ralph's idea), and once she's situated Happy scoots in the low table she'd built to hold Paige's laptop.

"Thanks guys." Paige hates how out of breath she sounds, since all she did was walk from Happy's truck to the chair, but she's exhausted already and knows she won't be getting much paperwork done today. Her shoulder is throbbing, all the way down to her fingertips.

Toby crouches beside her, and at her nod he lifts up the edge of her shirt to peer at the bandage. "I'll change it in an hour or two. Take it easy, it's just your first day back, okay? No rush to get back into the full swing of things."

She nods, feeling guilty for snapping at him earlier, but he just smiles and they all leave her in peace. She can tell that they're all watching her closely, though, but it's a nice feeling instead of a smothering one. The paperwork is probably backed up horrifically in her absence, so Paige sets her jaw and gets to work.

Every so often she'll get one of them to come over and sign something, but other than that, they leave her alone. Exhaustion begins to hit her even harder after almost an hour, which is when Toby ambles over and scoots her work table away.

She scowls. "Toby – "

"You need a nap," he says bluntly. "You look like an owl every time you blink."

"He's right."

She turns, surprised, to see Walter and Cabe, back from meeting a potential client. She didn't even hear the door open. "You weren't gone for very long. How did it go?"

Walter shrugs. "We'll see how badly they want to upgrade their security system. But Toby is right, Paige. You look exhausted."

"But I just started," she can't help but whine.

"Kid," Cabe says in that gruff, gentle way of his, "pushing yourself too hard too soon will only make the healing process take longer. You know that."

She sighs. "But I'm not _doing_ anything. I'm filling out paperwork, sitting in a cushy chair and being waited on hand and foot. I don't have a right to be this tired."

"You survived a gunshot wound to the chest," Walter says. His voice takes her off guard; he's never that sharp with her unless something's bothering him, but when she looks at him his face is smooth, neutral, and he even smiles a little. "You have every right to be tired."

"Just take a quick catnap," Toby coaxes. He has the first aid supplies for changing her bandage in his hand.

Paige huffs. "Fine. But I'm not going all the way upstairs."

"That's fine," Toby says absently. He perches on the arm of her chair and waits for her to undo the few top buttons of her blouse. "You shouldn't be doing stairs yet anyway; if you need to get to the loft then you'll use the ramp."

She literally _just_ said she didn't want to go upstairs, but now she's sorely tempted to get up and march over to the metal steps, just to irk them. She swallows another huff, because she knows they're only doing this because they care, in their own weird way.

Toby changes her bandage, and then Walter takes her hand to help her lie down on the couch. He releases her the moment she's settled, and the rough, abrupt way his fingers leave her own makes her frown. He's acted like this since she got out of the hospital – terse and short tempered, even a full week after her injury.

Paige doesn't have time to dwell on it. He walks away and Cabe is the one who drapes a light blanket over her and sits down nearby with a book until she drifts off.

/

She wakes up not quite an hour later, feeling ten years younger. She sits up so fast Happy drops her wrench.

" _Jeez_ , Paige," the mechanic snaps, as she hurries over. Paige holds up one hand to stop her.

"Don't. Let me try."

To be honest, Paige has no intentions of _trying_ anything. She is thoroughly sick and tired of depending on everyone else to do the most mundane tasks, and will be self-sufficient from here on out, thank you very much.

Happy seems to catch the stubborn tilt to her jaw, and pauses, watching Paige use her good arm to push herself up to a standing position. It's awkward and clumsy and hurts just a twinge, but she's on her feet by herself and can't stop smiling.

"Okay," Happy says, with a tiny, tiny smile of her own. "You hungry? Toby and Walter went to that Chinese place over on Crestwood; Cabe and Sylvester are bringing extra chairs down from the roof."

"Sounds wonderful," Paige sighs. Happy nods and goes to call the boys.

For a moment, she just stands there, relishing in her short moment of self-sufficiency. Her eyes wander over to her stack of paperwork. There's a whole folder of forms that need Walter's signature, but one glance at his desk tells her they'll get lost. Normally she puts everything he needs to sign on his desk upstairs, but…

She gnaws her lip, glancing toward the back of the garage. She can still hear Happy on the phone. There's no sign of Cabe or Sylvester coming back down from the roof. She could just…

 _No. Toby said not to._

Should she?

 _No!_

But it won't hurt…just once, as long as she's careful and goes slowly. She'll even come back down the ramp, just to pacify them.

Paige marches over, picks up the file – and winces, it's heavier than she expected and she automatically reached to steady it with her bad arm, and now it's throbbing a little. She turns to the stairs, checks for lookouts one last time, and timidly puts one foot on the bottom tread.

A hand immediately clamps down on her elbow; she gasps and almost drops the file.

"Happy," she starts, but the mechanic takes the paperwork out of her hand, tugging firmly on her good arm until Paige is seated at the table in the middle of the room, and takes a step back.

"What do you think you're doing?"

Paige, all set to defend herself, pauses when she notices how truly furious Happy is. She's never seen her friend like this, not with Toby or even Collins.

"I just- "

"You heard Toby. You might not be a genius but you're not dumb Paige, you should know better than to go behind a doctor's back –"

Paige narrows her eyes. There they go again, treating her like she's five.

"I think I can tell if I'm able to walk up a flight of stairs, Happy."

For a moment Happy looks too angry to even speak; it's then that Cabe and Sylvester reappear.

"What's going on?" Cabe says, setting down the metal folding chairs.

"Our resident people person decided that Doc didn't know what he was talking about." Happy's voice is acidic, drips and leaves holes in the concrete floor. "I caught her trying to carry these up the stairs."

Paige feels her temper spike. "It's just a staircase, why – "

"Kid." Cabe looks disappointed, and she hates the guilt that hits her, settles thick and sour in her stomach. "Doc might be overbearing sometimes, but you know as well as any of us that he knows his stuff. He says no stairs, then you need to stay off the stairs."

"And he's not the only doctor that's told you not to carry anything heavier than five pounds for the next couple of weeks." Happy waves the folder of documents in her direction.

She can feel the wind going out of her sails – Sly has never looked at her like he's looking at her now, and it makes her feel like she just kicked a puppy – but she refuses to yield. "It's just a bunch of paper."

Wordlessly, Happy hands the file to Sylvester, who shakes his head. "At least eighteen point three pounds. Probably closer to eighteen and a half."

"That's more than _three times_ –"

"I am capable of performing basic multiplication, thank you." Paige tries to snap, but her voice has lost the bitter edge, and now she just feels tired again. Tired and sore, and guilty. "Look, I understand this has all been really hard, and I understand it was a bad day – "

It's then that Happy swears, throws her cell phone; it shatters against the far wall.

"No, you don't. You _do not_ understand, because you were unconscious. You don't understand because you didn't see him."

She's breathing hard, and Paige wants to ask if she's okay, but doesn't get a chance.

"I have seen Walter break down exactly once in my life, and it was when he lost Megan. He's come to rely on you more than he ever did on her. And you were _shot_ in _front_ of him. He cut his wrists practically to the bone, pulling on those ropes. Do you remember how he screamed for you?"

Paige does, but vaguely. The look on Happy's tells her than the mechanic envies her, for not having a high definition recording seared into her brain.

"I watched him watch _you_ be taken back into surgery, and he was totally lost, and then he just _sat there_ like his entire world was caving in on him, and none of us knew what to do. Toby slept maybe six hours for the next week, because he had to make sure _you_ were okay so _Walter_ could be okay. All of us took turns watching Ralph, and that was almost worse because Walter wanted to help but he wanted to be with you…" Happy's voice cracks. Paige can feel tears welling in her eyes.

"Happy," she says, gentle, "I'm fine."

"Obviously," Happy spits. "But _we're_ not. Do you know what it takes for us, people like me and Walter, to admit that we're scared? Do you not see what that did to him, how just the _memory_ of that fear is making him afraid all over again?"

Somewhere behind them, in the middle of Happy's rant, Paige hears a throat being cleared.

Happy stops shouting, but she's panting and looks like she's angry enough to bite a nail in half.

Paige's ears are ringing. Dimly she hears Toby talking; he and Happy head up the roof, Cabe and Sylvester go into the kitchen, and she can feel the last remaining member of Scorpion behind her.

She can't face him. Instead she gets up and takes the ramp up to his loft, sits on the couch and lets him open her food, unwrap her chopsticks, all with keeping her head down.

"Are you hurt?"

She shakes her head. No, despite her idiocy, she hadn't managed to exacerbate the injury any. It was fine.

Walter pauses, weighing his options. "Could you please tell me what happened?"

Well, yeah, she could. But then he would be angry with her, rightly so, and she just doesn't think she has it in her to face that right now. She sighs. "I…I'm…not really sure I want to."

"I understand that," he says, a little brusquely, then pauses again. When he continues, his voice has softened, and she knows him well enough to know that he's doing it on purpose. "But…maybe you should. You're upset, and so is everyone else. I'd like to help fix it, if I can, but that will be rather difficult if I don't know what the problem is."

She wants to cry now, more than ever. _She's_ supposed to be the one who's in tune with the emotional needs of her teammates, and here's Walter doing her job for her.

She makes herself look up at him; he seems surprised and worried over the tears in her eyes. "You're not going to be very happy with me."

"What is it?"

"I…I tried to sneak and carry some case files upstairs."

"Well, you're allowed up here, if they needed to be on my desk – "

"No, I mean, up _the_ stairs."

"Oh." His mouth tightens, but she can tell he's trying to keep it reigned in, for her sake. "That…that could have ended very badly, Paige."

"I know. I just…I'm so appreciative of everything you guys have done, but it's hard not to be impatient."

He surprises her, and smiles a little. "Believe me, I know how that feels. But you need to trust Toby on this." He looks a little stern. "How heavy were the files?"

Oh, _boy_ does she not want to tell him that.

"Sly said they were roughly eighteen and a half."

" _Pounds?_ " Now he looks properly horrified.

"I know," she hurries on. "I know, Walter. It was incredibly selfish and stupid of me, and I'm sorry. Really. I should have known."

She's lost him. "Known what?"

He looks like he wants to hug her, but she dismisses the thought as wishful thinking. "I'm sorry," her voice is worse that Happy's was downstairs.

She rambles on for a minute before Walter pieces together what she's talking about, and then suddenly he's the one deciding they need to discuss that day.

Now she feels even worse – she's so caught up in her guilt she never once thought about whether or not Walter is ready for discussion.

"I understand that day was awful," she tells him. Every atom of her being is screaming out to touch him, but she clenches her fist, grits her teeth and remains still. "It's fine – "

"No," he says, surprising her by making steady eye-contact. "It's not fine. I'm not fine. I mean, m-more than I was, but…"

The emotions on his face are making her world tilt on its axis. Paige wants more than anything to say something, but even if her throat would let her speak she has no idea what words she would use.

"That…that day, Paige…we've done s-some crazy things, but nothing has ever sc…scared me more than seeing you get hurt."

There it is again, the admission of fear from someone who is supposed to be incapable of feeling it.

"Walter…"

"Cabe's right; I was bleeding badly from trying to break free of our bonds."

She follows his eyes to his wrists, where there are thin fading scars. She hadn't noticed in the hospital, probably due to all the pain meds she was on, but now the evidence of how hard he tried to save her makes the tears escape at last.

Walter's only-state-facts-voice reappears. "Anyway, once you'd woken up that night in the hospital, we all knew you were going to be okay. But I guess…I guess all of us are still scared, of _how_ scared we were. Especially me, because I usually don't feel fear."

She's staring when he looks up at her again, but before she can look away, his eyes are dark and intense all over again, and one of his hands reaches up, dusts gently on her cheek.

"Also b-because….you mean a lot to me. In some ways more than anybody else on the team. A-and I've been ignoring those feelings for so long, that when I saw that we might lose you, that _I_ might lose you…i-it was like the full depth of those feelings was suddenly thrown in my face."

Oh.

 _Wow._

What is she supposed to say to that? She hadn't been expecting to go from admitting fear to admitting… _that_. Both might be emotions, but they are far from similar.

"I couldn't pretend I was fine anymore."

He's scooted closer, much closer, and for once she can see his heart in his eyes, and now it's quite clear to Paige that fear and love are more closely related than she first thought.

"Walter." On her lips, his name is comforting and pleading all at once, and he must like something about it, because his hands are cradling her face and his lips are pressing, gentle but deeply, against hers.

She feels light-headed, dizzy, buzzed, elated and terrified – all of the things she remembers from their last kiss. He kisses her a little harder – but still so tenderly it makes her chest ache in a way that has nothing to do with the gunshot wound – and tips her backwards until she's reclining against the back of the couch.

All of a sudden it's like Walter's playing for keeps, like every little kiss and touch in the preceding moments was just a warm-up. She lays her palm on his chest, can feel his heart beating steady and fast and strong, and his lips are on her neck, and all she can think is _Walter._

"I thought I lost you."

He immediately tenses, and she knows that he didn't mean to let the words out, but strangely she's glad he did. She takes his hand and places it over her heart, and his eyes meet hers. She leans up to kiss him softly.

"I'm right here. I'm fine."

Walter nods, before kissing her again, and as his mouth opens against hers and the rest of the world fades away, Paige knows that for the first time in a week, Walter is _here_ with her, not lost in the fear and uncertainty, and that he'll be fine, too.


End file.
